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Dessert

Strawberry Tart

A tart of fresh strawberries in a puff pastry shell, topped with a glaze of beaten egg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and lemon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 53,532 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Strawberry Tart

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the strawberries

  1. Combine strawberries, cold clarified sugar, Madeira, and lemon juice in a basin. Mix gently without breaking the strawberries.

  2. Transfer the mixture into a pre-baked puff pastry shell and keep it cool.

Make the tartlets

  1. For tartlets, line tartlet pans with short pastry and fill with your choice of preserve or sweetmeat.

  2. Top the tartlets with finely shredded pastry, brush with beaten egg, and place them in a baking tin.

  3. Bake in a preheated oven at 400°F (200°C) until golden.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  2. Lemon + eggtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together44,316 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).

  3. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Sugar + madeira winetop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together343 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Madeira wine + lemontop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together466 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Sugar and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Fresh scarlet strawberries
Provide the main fruit flavour and the bulk of the filling.
Clarified sugar
Sweetens the filling and draws out juice from the strawberries.
Madeira wine
Adds a rich, aromatic depth of flavour to the strawberry filling.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the sweetness of the strawberries.
Egg
Glazes the tartlets, promoting even browning on the pastry.

The step that matters

Mix gently without breaking the strawberries. Crushing the berries releases excess juice and pectin unevenly, leaving the filling watery and its appearance spoiled. Whole berries hold their shape and texture in the finished tart.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, madeira wine, egg):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Lemonthe original
  4. Currantfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, madeira wine, egg. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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